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ARTICLE · 05 MARCH 2015

Federal Wage Claims? That's The Easy Part!

Fisher Phillips LLP
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Violations of state wage laws are accompanied by penalties and fines and the right to attorneys’ fees. These can quickly turn a claim for a few hundred dollars for vacation pay into a claim for multiple thousands of dollars.

United StatesEmployment and HR
Edward Harold
Edward Harold
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Retailers are all too familiar with collective actions filed under the Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA) making claims for unpaid overtime based on alleged misclassification of employees as exempt, working off the clock, or not counting all hours worked. But complying with the FLSA is a relatively simple task when compared to complying with the myriad of different state wage and hour laws that impact everything from paydays to vacation time.

For example, in January, Petsmart announced that it was settling a class action under California law related to its use of pay cards to provide employees' final wages. The amount of the settlement was $1.1 million to a class of 1100 employees. According to the complaint, Petsmart's pay-card practice did not comply with California labor code's requirements for using pay cards for wages. Disney was also hit with a California class-action lawsuit alleging it improperly failed to pay terminated employees for unused vacation time.

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